


Trigger

by Morpheus626



Category: Saints Row
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-07-03
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:27:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25045372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Morpheus626/pseuds/Morpheus626
Summary: The only day of 1000 Words of Summer 2020 that I got done lol, the first one. IRL stuff came up so I didn't get the rest done, but I'm proud of this one! A little snapshot of a fic, again exploring the relationship between my latest Boss Ellis and Johnny. I tried to keep it right around 1000 words, but of course I went over lol.
Relationships: Male Boss (Saints Row)/Johnny Gat
Kudos: 9





	Trigger

“I don’t think you have the guts.” 

The hand holding the gun at Ellis’ forehead shook, as much from Ellis as from the thunder and lightening outside it seemed. 

“You don’t, do you? Where on Earth did Maero find you anyway? You’re what, sixteen?” 

The hand wavered, but didn’t drop. “Eighteen. Old enough to get all this ink.” 

“Old enough legally to be tattooed with whatever Maero would demand you have put on you. You’ve got a brother in it, don’t you?” 

“We’re all brothers!” 

Ellis pushed away the gun to look down and pull his cigarettes and lighter from his pocket. “Yeah, no I get that. The Brotherhood, and all that jazz.” 

He lit the cigarette and slipped it between his lips, talking carefully around it. “But I mean you have like an actual blood brother in the gang, don’t you? Otherwise you wouldn’t even be here.” 

“You can’t know that.” 

Ellis shrugged and puffed on the cigarette, taking it back out of his mouth, letting it cradle in between two of his fingers. “Lots of things I shouldn’t know that I do. That’s what makes me such a boogeyman, if you believe everything on the street. Or maybe, I just have good sources of intel.” 

He smiled at the boy, because even at eighteen, this was a boy. Too soon exposed to violence and blood and death, like so many of them. “I’d believe the latter, if I were you. There’s only so much power in fairy tales, especially out here.” 

Tears glistened in the boy’s eyes, but the gun popped back up to Ellis’ head. “Enough.” 

“Of what? Me waiting for you to pull the trigger? Because I certainly agree there. I’m late for my date.” 

“Date?” 

“Yeah,” Ellis shrugged. “Shocking, I know. The big scary gang leader goes on dates like any other jack-off. But I was really hoping not to be late to this one, or he will come looking for me…” 

The screech of tires in the parking lot of the abandoned factory made him shake his head. “Never mind. He’s here.” 

At that, the boy’s eyes grew wide. “No.” 

“Oh yes. Exactly who you think. But I’ll make sure he lets you go,” Ellis said. “All you have to do is exactly what I say, and tell me exactly what I ask you. Can you do that?” 

The boy nodded, as the encroaching shadow of a wet and angry Johnny Gat came into the open garage of the factory. 

“Good. What’s your name?” 

“Kevin.” 

“Kevin,” Ellis popped his cigarette back in his mouth, and held out his hand. “Charmed.” 

Kevin shook, but looked ready to piss himself. 

“Hello darling,” Ellis sighed as Johnny charged over, reaching for Kevin. “Now, hang on.” 

“Why? I get here, this prick has a gun to your head-” 

“Johnny,” Ellis tried to interrupt gently.

“I’m not hanging fuckin’ on for anything. I have two hands, and the ability and desire to toss this jackass into the river, what the hell should I wait for?” 

“Because Kevin was about to tell me about his brother,” Ellis said matter-of-factly. “Go on, Kevin.” 

Kevin audibly gulped. “He’s in the Brotherhood.” 

“No shit,” Johnny spat. “So are you, with that fuckin’ ugly ass mullet.” 

“Johnny,” Ellis hissed. “I know you’re just mad I’m smoking, don’t take it out on him.” 

“He prefers I smoke a blunt if anything,” he said to Kevin. “Hates the scent of tobacco, but I just can’t give them up it seems. And when I want to stay clear-headed, what else am I to smoke?” 

“Don’t answer that,” Johnny commanded. 

“Kevin, don’t worry about it,” Ellis said softly. “What’s your brother’s name?” 

“What is this, exactly?” Johnny shouted. “Let me kill him! Why are you stopping me?” 

“Kevin, the name,” Ellis said, but his eyes were locked with Johnny’s. His cigarette was again in his hand, ash falling from it to the concrete floor of the garage. 

Johnny pushed Kevin aside, the gun in the boy’s hand clattering to the floor from the force. 

Ellis heard Kevin bolt, his heavy work boots thundering on the concrete floor and out into the parking lot. “You scared him.” 

There was anger in Johnny’s eyes, but it was replaced by tears as he dropped to his knees. His arms wrapped around Ellis’ legs, his face pressed into the rough black skinny jeans. 

“He wasn’t going to kill me,” Ellis said, and set his cigarette on the empty metal shelving unit near him. He let a hand rest on Johnny’s head; he’d have played with his hair if they were at home, but out and about Johnny’s frosted tips were well gelled and damn near glued in place as a result. 

“He could have.” 

Ellis shook his head. “He couldn’t. You know, when they can or not. It’s in the eyes. It won’t matter who it is, me or anyone else. He’ll never be able to pull the trigger, and that might just be what saves him. Maybe their parents will get one son back home safely.” 

“You can’t keep getting yourself into situations like this,” Johnny mumbled, his face still crushed against Ellis’ legs. 

Ellis loosened Johnny’s grip on his legs so he could kneel down to meet his gaze. “And how precisely should I manage that, while still running the Saints?” 

The tears had fallen now, faster than Johnny could brush them brashly away. “I don’t know. But I can’t take another-” 

His breath caught in his throat, and Ellis hugged him close. He didn’t need to say it. Another funeral. Another loss. Another lover gone and in the ground years before they should have been. Aisha had been enough, a sharp enough wound in Johnny that would likely never heal completely. 

“I know,” Ellis murmured, and groaned slightly at lifting Johnny to his feet. They weren’t horribly mismatched in size, but he was shorter even in his heeled boots and less muscle compared to Johnny. “But I can’t stop things like this either. Not all of them, at least.” 

“Then I’ll come find you every time,” Johnny said, and kissed him hard enough Ellis was sure his lips might bruise. 

He welcomed the bruise though, and every little sign like that, a beating like their hearts, _we’re still alive, somehow impossibly we’re still alive_.

“And I’ll look forward to stopping you like I did tonight,” Ellis replied. “Or helping you drop a body in the river, depending on who has me held hostage for the night.” 

“You say it that way and make it sound like you need a calendar for it,” Johnny grumbled, but smiled. 

“We’ll make that Pierce’s responsibility,” Ellis said. “He’ll hate it.” 

He hoped the joke (only half of one really, he actually did need to start keeping a calendar, and he hoped Pierce would take that task on and help him keep it properly updated) might make Johnny smile like he used to, a bit bolder and brighter and cocky in a way that was almost irritating. 

But the smile was small, and sad, and made him pick up his cigarette off the shelf only to drop it on the ground and put it out. After all this, the last thing he wanted to do was to torture Johnny with more tobacco.

He let Johnny lean on him as he led them back out towards Johnny’s car, the rain falling even harder than before. 

“Let’s go home.” 


End file.
